Edgar Wallace

“ In the midst of your everyday life you have a vivid yet elusive recollection of a past which is strange to you. You see yourself in circumstances and in a setting wholly unfamiliar. Like a flash it comes and goes; as swiftly as the shutter of a camera falls. Flick! It is gone and you can recall no incident upon which you can reconstruct the vision of the time-fraction. Beryl saw herself as she had been before she came upon a shabby gray-haired man studying the wallpaper in the hall of Dr. Merville's house. ”

“ Ronnie was amused.
"Are you traveling back to town tonight, Ronnie?"
"No, Sir John. I leave in the morning."
Sir John wrinkled his brows in thought.
"You saw him? Did you ever see a man like him? I am bewildered and baffled. Poor Sault, and yet why 'poor'? Poor world, I think, to lose a soul as great as his."
"He is also a murderer," said Ronnie with gentle sarcasm. "He has brutally killed two men—"
"There is nothing brutal in Ambrose Sault," Sir John checked himself. ”

“ What is the most decent, a wedding between two people who halfhate one another, but are marrying because one wants money and the other a swagger wife, or an everlasting love union between a man and a woman whom God has bound with bonds that a parson cannot strengthen or a snuffy judge cannot break?"
She sighed, the quick, double sigh of one half convinced.
"You make me feel that I'm common and—and brainless, and anyway, I don't want to talk about it. Ronnie, I suppose you're awfully busy this morning?" She looked wistfully at the big Rolls that was drawn up by the side of the road. ”

“ But I am never that. Half the unhappiness of life comes from the vanity of self-pity. It is the mother of all bitterness. Do you realize that? You cannot feel bitter without feeling sorry for yourself." She nodded.
"You miss a great deal—but you know that—poetry. I suppose you have that read to you?"
Ambrose Sault laughed softly. "Yes—poetry.
"'Out of the dark which covers me,
Black as a pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods there be,
For my unconquerable soul—'
"That poem and Theocrite, and only two lines of Theocrite, are the beginning and the end of my poetical leanings. ”

“ The play of color in her pretty face, the rise and fall of her narrow chest, the curve of chin and the velvet smoothness of her throat—he marked them all with the eye of the gourmet who watches lambs frisking in the pasture and sees, not the poetry and beauty of young life, but a likeable dish that will one day mature. "If you were a beggar-maid and I were a prince"—he began.
"I'm not much better, am I?" she asked ruefully, "and you are a prince, to me, Ronnie—" She was thinking.
"Yes?"
"How can anything come right for us? ”

“ Sault tell you?" asked Evie hotly. "He seems to spend his time gossiping about people who are a million times better than him—"
"Than he," murmured Christina, her eyes closed.
"He is a nasty scandal-mongering old man! I hate him!"
"He didn't say that Ronnie had been in prison," Christina's voice was gentle. "All that he said was that the only 'Ronnie' he knew was Ronald Morelle. He did not even describe him or give him a character."
"How absurd, Christina! As if old Sault could give Mr. Morelle 'a character'! One is a gentleman and the other is an old fossil!" ”

“ Dr. Merville cleared his throat. "Yes, he loves you, Beryl. A fine man, a little rough, perhaps, but a fine man and a very rich man."
"Yes?" said Beryl again and he grew more agitated.
"I don't know why you say 'Yes, yes,'" he said irritably, "a young girl doesn't as a rule hear such things without displaying some—well, some emotion. How do you feel about the matter?"
"About marrying Mr. Steppe? I suppose you mean that? I can't marry him: I don't wish to."
"I'm sure you would learn to love him, Beryl." ”

“ Nothing would make you wrong in my eyes. I should just love you and help you all I could. You know that. It isn't wise to keep some secrets, Evie, not if you know that there is somebody who loves you well enough to take half your burden from you."
"I don't know what you're driving at," said Evie in a fret, "you don't mean—? I'm a virgin, if that is what you mean," she said crudely.
Christina snorted. "Then what in hell are you snivelling about?" she demanded savagely. She was not unreasonably irritated.
"I haven't—seen—Ronnie—for a week!" sobbed the girl. ”

“ This was Ronnie Morelle. She had to tell herself all the time. He was the man whom Ambrose Sault had described as "foul" and Ambrose was so charitable in his judgments; the man who had taken Beryl Merville.
"I am glad you spoke of Evie," he went on. "She must not be hurt. At her age men make a profound impression and color the whole of after-life. It is so easy to sour the young. It is hard to improve on the old texts," he smiled. "I wonder why I try. 'As the twig is bent, so is the tree inclined.' I never think that it is wise to reason with a girl in love—fascinated is a better word. ”

“ Groping toward understanding, Evie seized this illustration. "God loves the martyr—it isn't one-sided," she quavered and Christina nodded.
"That is true, or it may be true. Does your god love you?"
"It is blasphemous to—to talk of Ronnie as God."
"God with a small 'g'."
"It is blasphemous anyhow. Ronnie does love me. He hasn't silly and conventional ideas about—about love as most people have. He is much broader-minded, but he does love me. I know it. A girl knows when a man loves her." ”

“ There has been some unpleasantness about a company father floated. Jan Steppe did it really, father is only a figurehead. He has had people to see him, people from the Public Prosecutor's office. He doesn't talk much about it to me, but I have a premonition that all is not well. But, Christina, I'm just whining and whining at you, poor girl!"
"Whine," said Christina. "Go on whining. I should scream! Beryl, my love, you have to do something for me, something to relieve my heart of a great unhappiness. I intended seeing you today—you had my letter?—well, I'm too late to stop you marrying. ”

“ She isn't like the hardy race of prostitutes we raise in Walter Street."
"I think your language is terrible, Christina! I ought to know you would defend this perfectly awful girl. You take a very lax view, Chris, it is a good thing I have a well-balanced mind—"
"You haven't," said Christina. "It isn't a month ago that you were sneering about marriage. I believe in marriage: I'm old-fashioned. Marriage is a wonderful bridge; it carries you over the time when, if you're not married, you are getting used to a strange man and comparing him unfavorably with your last. ”

“ Yet—I would make no sacrifice for Ronnie. I feel that. I have made no sacrifice. Women are hypocrites when they talk of 'giving': they make a martyrdom of their indulgence. Some women. And it pleases them to accept the masculine view of their irresponsibility. They love sympathy. For Ambrose I would sacrifice—everything. It is cheap to say that I would give my life. I have given more than my life. So have you."
Christina was silent.
"I have faced—everything," Beryl went on. She was sitting on a cushion between Christina and the fire, her tea cup in her hands. ”

“ Hysteria—suppose Steppe did come back? He went moist at the thought.
"Ronnie, why don't you?" she breathed. "It would save me. It would save father, too. He would accept the accomplished fact, and be relieved. Ronnie, it would save my soul and my body. I'd serve you as faithfully as any woman ever served a man, I would Ronnie. I'd be—I'd be as light as the lightest woman you know—don't you realize what I am saying—?"
"My dear girl," he said, thoroughly alarmed, "I couldn't oppose Steppe, he's a good fellow, really he is. I'm sure you'd be happy. ”

“ But François lingered. "M'sieur."
"Well?" asked Ronnie, turning with a scowl.
François was ill at ease.
"Tomorrow my brother is coming from Interlaken, may I have an evening for myself, M'sieur?"
Ronald was angry for many reasons: he was not in the mood to grant favors.
"You have Sundays and you have your holidays. That's enough," he said.
François went out crestfallen.
"I suppose you think I'm unkind," said Ronnie with a laugh, as he helped take off her coat. "But if you give that sort of people an inch, they'll take the earth." ”

“ But the chariot, dear Ambrose?"
"I've got it!" he chuckled at her astonishment, "it will come tomorrow. It is rather like a motor-car for I have to find a garage for it. In this tiny house there is no room. But I got it—no, it didn't cost me a great deal. Dr. Merville told me where I could get one cheap. I put new tires on and the springs are grand. Christina, you will be—don't cry, Christina, please—you make me feel terrible!" His agitation had the effect of calming her.
"There must be something in this room that makes people weep," she gulped. "Ambrose—Evie is just worrying me to death." ”

“ He says that Ronald Morelle is bad. The worst man he has ever met. He wasn't condemning him, you understand. In fact, he was admiring him. Moropulos would."
Christina was plucking at her underlip pensively.
"Poor Evie!" she said. "She thinks she is in love with him. He is a beautiful dream to her, naturally, because she has never met anybody like him. I wish he had made the mistake of thinking she was easy, the first time he met her. That would have ended it. What I am afraid of, is that he does understand her, and is wearing down her resistance gradually. What am I to do, Ambrose?" ”

“ Take that look off your face, Evie; there is no possibility of our being the rightful heiresses of the old Hall. But it is true; he had a coat of arms."
"Then why did he marry mother?"
"Why do people marry anybody?" demanded Christina. "Why did grandfather marry grandmother? Besides, why shouldn't he have married mother? He was only a cabinet maker when he met her. She has told me so. And his father was a parson, and his mother the Honorable Mrs. Colebrook, the daughter of Lord Fanshelm. There is blue blood in your veins, Evie." ”

“ They bob their hair and hate washing. They know people who have black wallpaper and scarlet ceilings and one white rose rising from a jade vase. Evie, I have been laying on the flat of my back ever since I can remember, and I've had a procession of sinners marching around my bed—literally. Mother let people come because I was dull. I don't know Lola. She is a little above us, but Lola's kind are bred around here by the score, pigging four and five in a room; they have no reticences, there are no mysteries. All the processes of life are familiar to them as children. ”

“ He met, had not feared to meet, the fury of Steppe's eyes and presently the big man turned away with a shrug.
"You might," he said, speaking more to himself than to Ambrose Sault. "One of these days I'll try you out. I'm not a weakling and I've beaten every man that stood up to me." He looked round at the visitor and the anger had gone from his face.
"I believe you about the safe. You're the first man or woman I've ever believed in my life. Sounds queer, huh? It is a fact. I'm not frightened of you—nobody knows that better than you." Sault nodded. ”

“ Ronnie had extinguished the others before he sat down.
"The wicked love the darkness, huh, huh!" Steppe chuckled, and then looking past him, Ronnie saw that he was not alone. Beryl waited at the door and behind her was Dr. Merville.
"Get dressed and come out," commanded Steppe noisily. "What's the matter with all you people, huh? Come along. We're going to a theatre. You're as bad as Beryl, sitting in the dark. You overbred people think too much." ”

“ She had never met so good-looking a man and instantly she absolved Evie for her infatuation. He did not offer his hand at first, and it was not until she was about to speak that it came out to her shyly. It was a strong hand and the warmth of the grip surprised her.
"Christina!" he said softly and she felt herself go red.
"That is my name. You are Ronnie Morelle? I have heard a great deal about you from Evie."
"From Evie?—yes, why of course! Your mother is looking well. She works very hard—too hard I think. Women ought not to do such heavy work." ”

“ There were no other kind of women to Moropulos. Suspecting, before there were grounds for suspicion, he had watched and justified his construction of the girl's friendship with Ronnie Morelle. He was certain when he watched her come out of the Knightsbridge flat that if he had been fortunate, he would have seen her there before, perhaps the previous night. Beryl was no less in his eyes than she had been. She was bad. All women were bad, only some were more particular than others in choosing their partners in sin. ”

“ Evie was very stiff, very determined, sourly virginal. "Of course, you can't believe all that you read in the newspapers, but there is no smoke without fire."
"And every cloud has its silver lining," said Christina. "Let us all be trite! What is worrying you, Evie? I think it was fine of Ronnie to look after the girl."
"And they drove away from the court together!" wailed Evie.
"Why not? It is much better to go together than by taking separate routes and pretending they weren't meeting when all the time they were." ”

“ He is not a good man."
"What is a good man?" Moropulos demanded contemptuously. "He is a lover of ladies, who isn't? He is a cur too. Steppe walks on him. He is scared of Steppe but then everybody is, except you and I." Ambrose smiled.
"Well, perhaps I am—he is such a gorilla. But you are not."
"Why should I be? I am stronger than he."
Moropulos looked at the man's bare arms. "Yes—I suppose it comes down to that. The basis of all fear, is physical. When will the safe be finished?" ”

“ That's the kind of man I am. No nerves—look at my hand." He thrust out his heavy paw stiffly. "Steady as a rock, huh? Good boy, Sault!"
"I met him once—" began Ronnie.
"I've met him more than once," said the grim Steppe. "A man with strange compelling eyes, the only fellow that ever frightened me!" ”

“ Is it not possible that the soul germ might be discovered? For a soul has no size and no weight and no likeness to man. Some people think of a soul as having the appearance of the body which it inspires. That is stupid. If death can cling to the point of a needle and life grows from a microscopic organism, how infinitesimal is the cell of the soul! The souls of all the men and the women of the world might be brought together and be lost on one atom of down on a butterfly's wing!"
The lawyer listened hopefully. ”

“ And then I shall have to get mother into a philosophical mood and try to make her see that it is better for a child to be illegitimate than not to be born at all."
"Good gracious!" said Ambrose, startled. "But it may be—just a friendship."
"Rats!" said Christina contemptuously. "Friendships between attractive shop girls and well-to-do young men! I've heard about 'em—platonic. Have you ever heard of Archianassa? She was Plato's mistress. He didn't even practice the kind of love that is named after him. Evie is a good girl and has really fine principles. ”

“ You are uncharitable, Christina! Nothing Ronnie does is right in your eyes. Of course he didn't hint. It is the way he looks, when I speak about her. I know that he doesn't like her very much. He admitted it, because, just after we had been talking about her, he said that I was the only girl he had ever met who did not bore him—unutterably. ”

“ In two hours the soul of Ambrose Sault—
The soul! What was the soul? Was it Driesh's "Entelechy;" that "innnermost secret" of animation? Was there substance to the soul? Was it material? A flame, Merville had once called it, a flame from a common fire. Could the flame leap at will from a man's body and leave him—what? A lunatic, a madman, a beast without reason? Ronald shrugged away the speculation, but the scholar in him was uneasy and insensibly he came back to the problem.
The promise of fair weather was belied as the car drew nearer to Wechester. ”